“All that education … and you wrote about a lift.”
I was trying to explain to mum what I’d been doing this week. I have been trying to explain what I’ve been doing with my life ever since I was nine and told her I wanted to be a hairdresser.
“Best not tell your dad,” she advised me then, taking the brush out of my hand and hiding my sister’s Tippy Tumbles doll (for those without the benefit of a 1970s childhood, here is Tippy Tumbles:
We were so innocent back then.)
“People seemed to like it, mum,” I said, “they laughed . . .”
“People! How many? Your friends you mean,” she said, “and now you think you are a comedian!”
Mum has always been a rock of support.
“Not many,” I told her, just the one tear plopping unnoticed onto the kitchen lino, “and no mum, I really don’t …”
“Then why do you do it?” She persisted. “Why bother?”
Mum had put her wagging finger on the very question that’s been throbbing in my head like an untreated gum infection for some time. Why bother indeed?
“It’s fun,” I said, not entirely with overwhelming conviction.
“Fun!” mum snapped, “fun can wait till weekends. Fun won’t pay the bills.”
Mum is a battle-hardened warrior for the work ethic. She doesn’t believe that having fun between 8am Monday and 5.30pm Friday is conducive to earning a living and supporting our downtrodden utilities companies. She considers a proper job involves overalls, tubs of Swarfega and the loss of an occasional finger. She thinks a grown man ought to be placing a wage packet on the scullery table every Thursday without fail. I am a great disappointment.
“But mum … I enjoy it.”
That comment is like a red rag to an old lady who thinks any rag other than grey is an impertinence.
“You weren’t a funny kid, you know. I don’t remember you laughing and joking much, not like your sister,” she said. “Always had your head in a book.”
Which was indeed true, and still is. Sister also has a responsible job, a reliable income and a respectable overdraft. She is – and everyone knows it – a saint.
“Yes mum, I know. I wish I knew how that happened,” I said, “but I’d better be away now and dash for the bus. I’m working tonight.”
“Working?”
“I’m at an event called Head at Temple Works.”
“The place that looks like it’s falling down!” She said, “Trust you to work in a place that looks like it belonged to Dr Frankenstein.”
“Well, come to mention it …”
“What you doing there?” Mum cut off my story about the BBC shooting Frankenstein’s Wedding there a couple of years ago:
“Working doing what?”
“It’s an event. Sort of a party. People dress up and … and do stuff. With … stuff. It’s hard to explain”
“Party!” She spluttered. “Dressing up! … How’s that work!”
“I have to be there till 5am, mum … doing stuff. Making sure things go ok. It’s about the insurance …”
I could see that I was fighting a losing battle against a superior enemy. I was out-manoeuvred, against a wall with no ammunition left. Mum would never be won around to the idea that propping up the bar all night talking to transvestites could be in any sense called “work”.
I made my goodbyes and headed for the bus out of Thorpe.
I’ll be at Temple Works all evening, working. If anyone fancies joining me there are a couple of review tickets I can get my hands on. It’ll be more fun than writing about a lift.